Conventional bulkhead fittings are routinely used in laboratories and industry to allow repeated separation and attachment of continuous tubing and/or to provide fluid communication through a wall of a container such as a bioreactor, a tank or other vessel. A first end of the bulkhead fitting may be configured to engage with a tube or other fluid conduit so as to provide fluid communication between an external source and the container. A second end of the bulkhead fitting is generally threaded. In particular applications, the wall of the container is tapped so that the bulkhead fitting may be secured by screwing the bulkhead fitting into the tapped portion of the container. However, the wall of the container may be too thin to be tapped, thereby requiring the use of at least one nut and/or washer to secure the fitting to the closed container. In certain instances, such as in a sterile environment, a fluid-tight relation between the container and the bulkhead fitting may be required. As such, a thread sealing tape such as a polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) film may be wrapped around the threads of the bulkhead fitting, thereby forming a seal between the bulkhead fitting and the container once the fitting is threaded into the container.
In various applications, the container may be formed from a plastic or some equivalent material. Residual stresses may form in the container walls from the tapping process and/or from the molding or forming processes, thereby resulting in cracking in and around the tapped portion of the container. This cracking may result in excessive leakage around the tapped threads, may allow for contamination to enter the container and/or may compromise the structural integrity of the container. Although the thread sealing tape may be used to reduce the possibility of leakage, the tape itself may also be a source of contamination. In certain instances, the container may include multiple bulkhead fittings connected to multiple tubes that extend outward and around the container, thereby resulting in multiple opportunities for cracking to occur and/or for contamination to breach the container.
In certain instances, it may be necessary to place the container and associated tubing in a space-limited environment. For example, but not limiting of, the container and tubing may be placed in a test oven, a well drilling apparatus, an automobile, an aircraft, or an environmentally controlled apparatus. However, current bulkhead fittings generally extend outward from an outer surface of the container, thereby significantly increasing the footprint and/or volume required within the space-limited environment so as to accommodate the container and associated tubing. In addition, connecting the tubes to each of the bulkhead fittings may be very cumbersome and time consuming due to limited space and/or the need to re-wrap the threads under difficult circumstances such as sterile conditions, where the fitting is out of reach for two hands, etc. Therefore, a non-threaded fitting that reduces mechanical stresses on the container and/or reduces the potential of contamination within the container and/or decreases the difficulty of attaching the fitting to the container would be useful in the art.